Vamos!

I am happy to report that I managed to leave Frankfurt in time for Spain and arrived as planned. Needless to say I brought too much stuff with me (20.9 kg plus the backpack at check-in) but that's just the way it is, I might as well accept it ...

Anyway - let's start at the beginning. I kinda slept like 3 hours as I woke up at 5 and was totally awake. Having not prepared anything for the trip, I thought it a good idea to actually get out of bed and start packing. So I spent the next 4 hours more or less packing, washing the dishes, doing the laundry, playing with Arnie-The-Robot, basically a very efficient way of spending my last couple of hours before leaving my place for 3 weeks.

Alba took me to the airport - Thanks a million - I know who is getting some pintxos sponsored by Gaborno in San Sebastian once we are there!

Anyway - the flight to Madrid was pretty lame - nothing special happened - arrived in Madrid on time. Madrid Airport is VERY STYLISH. And the people!!! They are sooooo cool! I tend to forget that people can be quite stylish and fashionable after living in Germany for so long. Which is actually cool because I don't expect this any more and every time my eyes basically fall out when I travel abroad. And the funny thing was not only that I didn't know where to look because of so many cool people around, but I heard Maria all around the place. I don't know why Maria (maybe because most of my other spanish friends don't speak so much spanish when I am around?) but I had the feeling she was everywhere :-)

The flight to Bilbao was crazy. Turbulences all the time. I was dying. People were actually screaming at every drop. This time it paid off that Iberia is one of the bastard airlines not giving out any food for free, so there was no food & drinks flying around on board. After an hour of misery we arrived in Bilbao and it was raining!!!! And cold!!!! I could not believe that I left warm Germany for cold rainy Spain!!!! I felt a bit better after a couple of SMS-s from Frankfurt telling me that the weather turned bad there also (evil me - bru - ha - ha - ha).

There is a pretty good bus connection from Bilbao airport to the city. When you leave the terminal, just go down to the street straight away, turn right and there is a bus-a-stoppe in sight to the right (about 30 meters I would say). The bus leaves every 30 minutes and it costs €1.20. Needless to say I just missed it by 2 minutes so I waited for the next one patiently. It was raining after all, so no hurry...

The rain stopped once we got to the city. If you want to see the Guggenheim Museum from the bus, sit on the right side. The bus is crossing the big bridge next to the Museum. You can get off the bus at "Moyua" and you are in the middle of the city. I took the metro from here to the old town (Casco Viejo) because I was lazy and didn't feel like dragging my luggage all the way and after getting out of the metro I looked for the place I reserved, which was a story on its own...


I found this place in the Lonely Planet and it looked totally central and by far the cheapest. They have also a nice website (by the way, it is so funny how all the spanish places I checked on the internet use the .com ending and not the .es) - anyway I was very surprised when I called them to make a reservation (according to the website this is only possible via phone) and the following happened:

Man: Si?
Me: Hola, do you speak English?
Man: No Ingles or something similar
Me: Hmmm - I would like to reserve a room
Man: I just said I don't speak English - or something similar in spanish of course (this is purely hypothetical - did I mention I didn't speak spanish?)
Me: OK

This "conversation" took place about once per hour on Thursday as I hoped to get someone else on the phone - I was pretty sure that he would have to go to the toilet, shopping, whatever. No. there was no chance of getting anybody else. In the end I gave up and thought, I would just go there when I am in Bilbao. On Thursday evening at Albas I told her this story and wanted to show her that there was no chance and dialled the number - actually this time he said "Momentino" and called someone who could speak English. So I had my reservation (or so I thought).

So I arrive at the place, which was actually easy to find and ring the bell. Guess what - I am greated by that famous Si?-voice!!! I am about to meet the guy I had so much pleasure talking to! Of course I say in my best Spanish (basically in English) that I have a Reservacion (notice the c in the middle!) under Gabor and he asks me in. As I went for the cheaper option, I had to climb 4 floors to be greated by a nice old lady, who - surprise - did not speak any other language than Spanish. It was so funny - I went in and spent the next 10 minutes looking at a desperate couple from Germany trying to explain to her that they leave so early the next day that they had to leave the key somewhere for her to find. It was actually very funny - they used the back pages of the Lonely planet with the emergency dictionary and were successful in the end.

Then came my turn. Of course they did not find my reservation first and I got a bit scared they would turn me away. But then they did and were very puzzled that I was alone and my reservation was for a double room (they didn't have a single room any more so I went for a double room which was 5 Euros more expensive). This caused quite some confusion and she asked me a million questions - I didn't understand any of them of course. In the end she gave me a room for 3 people and I paid for a room for one. Of course I didn't object :-)

After checking in at the hotel I went around the city for the next couple of hours - bumped into a theatre show for little kids and later the Guggenheim Museum, enjoyed some of the rain and went to a local food chain selling bocadillos. Oh, and almost forgot to mention the two girls I saw vomiting into a small river (?) near the old town and then going back for more alcoholic drinks. What an experience!!!

Oh, almost forgot! I learned my first spanish sentence! Thanks, Mediamarkt!

schankedön!!!!

Thanks, everybody for coming to Schöneberger for my Birthday. It was a bit delayed party but nevertheless it was fun to see all of you there.
Thanks again for the great present!!!!! I promise I will teach Arnie some tricks once I am back from Spain.

ps: Jack - I want to have the video you made at the place - can you upload it to youtube or something? Would be great!!!

espain is ebooked

eyeeppeeee!!!!!

eafter ea ewhole eday eof ecalling ethe ehostel ein ebilbao ei efinally emanaged eto ebook ethe eroom ei ewanted!!!!!


plus the room in barcelona turned out to be a bit "problematic" given that a million idiots occupy ALL THE ROOMS for the weekend to watch the stupid formula one grand prix de espana. anyway - Alba and I booked the two last beds in the probably shittiest hostel in the city (why else would there be two beds still efree????) - so we hope to meet tons of celebs on the weekend of the 11-12-13th of May.

Here we eGO!

It's business time!!!

With everybody coupling up or leaving town it came down to Alba and me - we spent the evening at her place eating delicious pasta, chatting with a completely drunk Jack in South Africa (he drank a whole Smirnoff!!!!!) and watching clips on youtube. Luke told us the day before in Mainz about this comedy duo called Flight of the Conchords

Also check out "Jenny" and "Something for the Ladies" and the rest. Thanks, Luke!!!

I am back - but not connected

I am happy to report to all my humble readers that I have returned to Frankfurt in a happy state after one of the nicest vacations I have had for many years and feel super-duper. Except the fact that the bastards from IESY (my planned new internet provider) did not register my order for internet and so I am cut off from the digital world at home for the next couple of weeks. So I am currently trying to live without - which will not make the posting of the photos, blogging, etc. iesy-er, but rather more diefficult...

On the other hand this might mean more time spent reading a book, listening to the radio, going out or going to the fitness center, etc. (hopefully not more watching TV though) ...

Anyway - I will try to post the pics and some stories soon, but it will probably be not so soon ...

Ciaoooooooo :-)

I'm loving it

don't want to waste time in a hot internet place so don't expect any more updates until I return. Best vacation ever! Thanks Maike for the address!!!
See You!

connected

India is coooooooooooooooooooooooool. Everything is fantastic - especially the fact that I am on vacation. Spent the last two days overcoming the jetlag and tomorrow we will go to Baga Beach and look for a place to stay for the next week or so. If you want to send me birthday wishes (coming up next week) - my phone number is +91 99 703 720 26.

Oh yes, Maike - if you read this, can you please SMS me the name and address of the place in Mumbai we went to eat last year? I forgot to bring their card with me... If possible, a phone number would be also awesome (the word of today :-)

Greetings to everybody - watch this place for updates!!! And drink SNAPPLE - I did and it was, well, anyway ...

I ndia!!!!

Here we go again ...

-

Watch this space for updates!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

I remembered today my old buddy Nevres, who once told me that you should do something that you have never done before every year of your life. I don't know why but i remembered this today.

BTW let me introduce you to a new member of the family: The Exilim S770 - just in time for the trip to India ...


BTW - I am trying to finish blogging the last year of India before I go there again this year - it would be a pity if this year's memories would overwrite the ones from last year. Let's see how far I get - check it out in the Feb 2006 section.

85 & 14 - let's party!!!

I am 85 kilos heavy and have 14 emails in my Inbox. These are astonishingly low numbers considering the last couple of months. This calls for a celebration. Therefor tonight I spent hours and hours painting my blog completely blueish in the background. It was not an easy tasks - especially with letters like "e" and "a" I had to be very careful not to leave out the holes in the middle. But I am happy to report that I made it and I could not be happier with the result. (Yes, I know I am a geek - but to be honest I don't care at this point what you all think - instead I am just enjoying the ride ... plus I am soooooo excited about the coming days in Goa that I really am just plain happy :-) see?

The kilos can be explained very well by my recent fitness center presence. Since the marker hit the 90 kg mark around 3 weeks ago I have been going to the fitness center almost every day. I started with an hour on the cross trainer and have progressed from being dead at the end to a status where I am smiling at the end even though I had kept a heart rate of around 151 for about an hour (that is what the machine suggested to me at the cardio setting, so don't start questioning, the machine is always right, right?) Anyway - I went from a "drop-dead-worn-out" state after 60 minutes to a "let's-do-a-circuit-and-then-let's-do-60-minutes-and-be-happy-about-it" state of mind. Plus I have been doing sit-ups so my belly hurts like hell. Actually the belly is still there - the only difference is what the scale is telling and how I feel, not how I look - but it's a good start into spring, which starts tomorrow.

The thing is, I have been really enjoying the fitness center lately. I am doing my round on the machines first and then an hour on the cross trainer, listening to my iPod and watching shows like The Simpsons, Hogan knows best or Pimp My Ride. It's sports and culture at the same time - what else could I wish for?

The number 14 is a complete mystery to me as work has been really stressing lately - but I am glad about it as the control-freak side of me will not have too many things to worry about work during the next couple of weeks in India.

Alpha Dog - Sneak Preview

A very nice movie about a horrible tragedy that didn't have to happen. Fantastic actors, very slow and melancholic storyline - plus certainly one of the best stories recently shown in a movie. A mixture between Almost Famous, The Ice Storm and [insert favourite Mafia movie title here]. Plus Justin Timberlake dressed more or less in tatoos and a pair of trousers.

UPDATE - I know where I saw two of the guys before - The Girl Next Door :-)

a flaming chicken!!!

Stress Management

Yesterday we had a stress management session at work. It was very interesting - especially when the lady showed the symptoms of stress. I seemed to be having every one of them, expect the diarrhea part - which came in the evening... It totally reminded me of the Yoga weekend in Vienna a couple of years ago when they talked so much about a certain cleansing process and then we did some exercises and then I went home and spent the rest of the day on the toilet cleansing so to speak. Sorry for being so open about this, but it is amazing, what an effect it seems to be having on me if I become aware of certain things about what my body and mind go through sometimes.

So now I understand what is happening to me. It's stress. And so I am very happy that in only one week from now I will be on some beach in India surrounded by local people who will want to sell me stuff and I will be Mr. Cool and will just not care at all. I have to remember to watch "Office Space" before going there and also to look for a relaxing hypnosis - or at least a massage place. Actually massage sounds better...

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

(click here if you can't see the video above)

I got crazy today. In the morning Yara and I went to the Indian Consulate in Frankfurt to get our Visas. We have checked the website before to make sure we have everything that they need. then it turns out of course they needed more stuff than we had. They asked for a confirmation that we have lived in Germany for the last 3 years. Otherwise no Visa. No discussion, that is the rules (of course it is not written anywhere on the form or the website) - and we all know who wins these discussions. So in the end it took a detour for Yara back home to get her older passports and for me to the Bürgeramt to get a confirmation of the last 3 years spent in Germany and so we finished at 10:30 instead of 9:30 as planned. As an added bonus the S-Bahn was not on time so we took a taxi to the office. Total costs of India until now have so climbed to €591 including the Taxi and the Visa.

In the afternoon I went back again to pick up the Visas and queued for 40 minutes because they served 3-4 people who had tousands of questions or dared to discuss some things and some people even that submitted their Visa applications in the Visa collection time. They had only one counter open for like 70-80 people but whenever someone appeared at the other counter this person got served. I am a sucker and so I didn't go there. I was sooooooo mad. And when it was my turn, they asked me again for the confirmation because they kind of lost it. Thank god I had only given them a copy and kept the original in the morning - otherwise there would be breaking news on CNN right now about an Indian Consulate in Frankfurt burning down to ashes...

Dear consulate employees, I know I don't have my own Kingdom but I am trying to spend some time (and money) in your country and for me you are the face of that country and I don't see why I need to be treated like this. I just don't want to enter that building ever again. Next time I will do the whole thing via mail :-)

So, this being out in the open - I am now focusing on getting the whole GOA thing organized. To be continued ...

the LAME number 23

spolier ahead - don't read this if you intend to watch the movie "the number 23" with Jim Carrey (or with someone else ...)

They showed "The Number 23" at the sneak preview. This movie tries to be very SIN CITY and very conspiracy and so and in the end it turns out that the main character indeed killed all those people, wrote that stupid book and then forgot the whole thing after he underwent psychiatric therapy. I like Jim Carrey but this is just very lame...


On the other hand when I tell this to people they kind of become interested to watching the movie - maybe I just need that vacation ...

I am in love :-)

they threw her out in the last show but she has returned. The competition is back!!!

300 * w o w !

Just heard about this movie called 300 - the poster contains the number 300 written (actually more like splattered) with blood. The trailer is unbelievable - inspired by Frank Miller (Sin City) this movie is again setting a new standard. I guess it will be pretty brutal, but can't wait to see it.


Check out the trailers here or here.

UPDATE: Iran is not very happy about this movie.

Kane is back!!!

Command & Conquer is coming back! It might not be the biggest news for you, but for me this is like a dream come true and I am actually thinking about getting a new computer just to play this game. I remember playing through nights in my old room in Vienna with the headset on my ears because of my parents, who have never understood the game and always thought it was some kind of shoot&kill game just because there were units that said "Yes, Sir" all the time before they moved where the mouse showed. My brother teased me just as much actually - but this game was the first and best of this kind and I can't wait to try out the new version.


ps: watching TvTotal, just realized that Joss Stone looks just like Yara with her new haircut - only a bit more red ...

Volleyball anyone???

sorry for posting too many videos recently - i just think they are funny :-)

india is booked!!!

weekend celebrity update

Spent the weekend in vienna - shopping, climbing mountains around the city (Grinzing), catching up with friends. Met the complete Mainz Football Team at the airport including trainer Jürgen Klopp jumping the economy queue on Friday and the Canadian indoor hockey team (finished Nr. 9 at the World Cup in Vienna) on their way back from Vienna to Frankfurt this morning so I decided to have a celebrity theme today.


So let's start with Thursday - the Vienna Opera Ball (Opernball). This Ball is the biggest official ball in Austria - with most of the government present, together with all kinds of artists, intellectuals, showoffs, etc. If you are rich and / or famous, you should go. There is full coverage on TV also. Normally it does not get too much coverage outside Austria unless some trashy celebrity comes and visits - there is a guy called Richard Lugner, who owns a huge construction company in Austria and he invites "stars" to the ball to show off his fortune. He is also called "Mörtel", which means something that fills the gap between bricks when building a house. He is like 70 years old and has a wife of 40 or so called "Mausi".

Anyway - so Mörtel and Mausi have invited people of smaller or bigger calibers over the years. I remember Pamela Anderson, Sophia Loren (sometimes they actually manage to get a real celebrity with style totally embarrassing themselves when they figure out who booked them), Sarah (Fergie), Farrah Fawcett, Geri Haliwell (scary spice), Grace Jones (who totally trashed a Hotel room in Vienna that Mörtel had to pay for in the end) and this year it was the one and only Paris Hilton. Part of the invitation is normally an hour-long meet-the-fan session in the Lugner City, which is a big shopping mall in the not-so-elegant part of town. I don't think any of these celebs is aware of what awaits them there. This year Paris got lipsticks thrown at her (click here for the video on youtube). She looked better in the evening at the Ball though.

Also Britney shaved off her hair. It seems that in a moment of craze she went amok and just did it. I am not sure if I feel sorry for her or am starting to like her. There is something about this picture I like.

diversitysn't

I took the bus from Darmstadt after work to go to the airport to go to Vienna. Normally the bus needs about half an hour to get there. We go via the highway, everything under control, the usual Friday crowd to the airport - some business-people, some tourist-looking people, some others. We take the A5 normally and we notice that trucks passing by honking at us - strange. Then the bus takes an exit to a gas station, the driver stops and gets out. No message, nothing. He gets back in, takes his mobile phone and gets out again. No message, nothing. The clock is ticking. Then he talks on the phone for some minutes, people start getting nervous, gets back in and tells people that the bus cannot go on because some door is open and he cannot close it. So there will be another bus in 20 minutes.

Needless to say I am not very relaxed at this moment - and so is the guy behind me. So before I can think about it, he is already calling a taxi. So I ask him if I could join. Sure, he says. Another 2 people ask and we are leaving the bus. Some more people make some more calls. Here comes the funny part. The diversity of the people on the bus surfaces. Some people stay on the bus, some get off.

The 4 of us are waiting for the taxi to arrive. A blond girl with an Ipod and a shiny mobile phone gets picked up by a huge Mercedes first (papa-driven I assume). Two backpackers go around the gas station and begin to ask every single driver if they go to the airport. They eventually get lucky and board a small Peugeot. Finally also our taxi arrives and we get in. The ride to the airport is fast and it turns out to be sponsored by accenture as the guy who called the taxi works for accenture and is going to expense it of course.


It's funny how a mix of people gets dissolved in a crisis and people revert back to what they really are.

f***ing stefan raab!!!

I just watched The Truman Show - and thought that i actually managed to escape valentine's day - and now there are stupid couples kissing on the stage in TV-Total and Stefan Raab is singing one cheesy song after another - a kind of Knutsch-Song-Megamix.

I am going to bed now. And by the way, the blog color is back to normal.

aus.
schluss.
basta.
buonanotte.

I choo- choo- choose you :-)

I found pics of my all time favourite valentine cards from The Simpsons. I think they are great.




... other than posting these two cards and the nice pink background on my blog, I am looking forward to totally ignoring this wonderful event. Happy Valentines Day Everybody!!!

3 weird things

... happened today on my way home

1.) Ghost train: I went to the train station in Darmstadt - there were no delays shown, no trains at the station but all the platforms were full of people. Then my train got canceled only to arrive 10 minutes later without any warning. It was a bit weird boarding a train to nowhere just because it arrived at the same platform the original train was supposed to arrive...

2.) A Disturbed dog: I got off the train in Frankfurt and started walking towards the underground when I saw a woman walking with a dog - the dog stopping and peeing. Problem was, the dog was peeing on a young girl's leg!!! Needless to say, it took the girl quite some time to recover from the first shock but then a heated discussion started. People stopped to watch but they settled it so quickly that there was no mud fight unfortunately. What a disturbed dog ...

3.) Hooligans: Sitting in the underground a weird looking business guy got in at the European Central Bank. He had very strange round glasses. The next stop - Römer - some 5-6 guys got in - first I thought they were hooligans but my second thought was that they were actually going to check our tickets. The weird guy must also have had the same thoughts so he tried to get out of the train acting like he just forgot to get out - but he was pushed back with a loud "can I see you ticket please?". Basically the more disgusting and scary / strange a group of 5-6 people on the underground look like, the more likely it is, that they are actually there working for the train company checking tickets. This other time I was being checked by what I thought to be a group of 6 mentally challenged sweaty fat people. In the end I thought I could have saved the guy as it was after 19:00 and I had a monthly ticket, but not if he tries to jump out of the train right next to the controllers!!!

One more thing: there is another city in Germany without traffic signs ...

here i am ...

I have finally found that special something that I have been looking for for such a long time to pimp up my blog. The thing is called plazes and is a social networking service in connection with location tracking. I have signed up, set up my home location and started SMSing whenever I left my place. So from now on you can see where I am whenever you come to my blog - just look to the top right section. It is pretty cool - you simply send your location via SMS and you get a reply from the system so that you know if it knows the place or not. There are a couple of users in Frankfurt already, but not too many. You can discover new plazes and get points for doing so. It also calculates your average speed when going around. Let the race begin!!! (though I guess now I will need an SMS-flatrate, otherwise this will cost me a fortune :-)

DSDS on YouTube

I got an invitation to anti-diet paradise (casa Alba) tonight and so am staying a bit longer in the office so I am not there too early. Just enough time to update the blog with the recent highlights of the "Deutschland Sucht Den Superstar (DSDS)" candidates.

Here is a list of my favourite moments:
1. Tanja the gardener (just watch and cry :-)
2. Andreas (Dieter Bohlen is the most straightforward person in the world - but wait until the guy plays the piano - wow) -> they threw him out in the meantime because he has Zero "Ausstrahlung"
3. Mr. Love spielt ein bisschen was für euch :-)

Absolute highlight of the day: Nadine


BONUS

sometimes people make a war ...

I found this clip on the internet - it is a kind of anti-war rap song from Hungary. It is so funny - I guess you can only enjoy it if you speak a bit of hungarian or if you know how hungarians speak english when they cannot really but are trying anyway. Sorry if it is not funny to you - I enjoyed every second of it ...

ICELAND!!!!!

Years of peaking at the icelandair website are paying off finally (ok, I am a bit exaggerating here, but who cares?). They have a new promotion running as of tomorrow - you can fly back and forth for a measly 140 Alpendollars!!! both ways!!!

If anybody wants to join, let me know. I will be booking tomorrow first thing in the morning! Looking at my list of things to do from my last visit, this will be another great weekend!!! This time I will try not to forget to check out the mask :-)

more about the deal here: http://www.icelandair.de

UPDATE - this just in - I have kept my promise not to travel to this madman-country of the US of A for a long time now. Recently only have I began to think I was too stupid and felt a kind of an urge to visit NY - and now I am reading that they are going to have every visitor's fingerprints taken and put into the same database that the FBI keeps for the criminals. What a fantastic way of catching criminals. Bastards! (I know that my last word is not really an argument, but I don't think arguments help here any more)

Bottom line - I am back to where I started. There are plenty of other places to visit on mother earth...

the return of the blog :-)

I was planning to switch on the big marketing machinery to bring back the blog - but i am too lazy for this. So instead here are some rather shocking photos of harry potter - yes, it's him. They are actually from a play in London, that opens end of February. It is a rather strange story involving 'arry going naked, a white horse, a psychiatrist and more weirdness...

By the way, the rest of the cast is also pretty impressive. Among others there is Richard Griffiths, who played uncle Vernon in the HP movies ...

This just reminds me - it must be great to live in London ... Here is another photo of Harry with a horse ...